The Disney-YouTube TV dispute will not extend into a third football weekend.
Disney and YouTube TV on Friday announced that they have reached agreement on a new carriage deal, ending a two-week stalemate that resulted in all of the Disney networks — including ESPN and all ABC stations — being unavailable to subscribers of the Google-owned vMVPD.
Under the deal, ESPN Unlimited will be available to YouTube TV subscribers free of charge via authentication — as is the case with other distributors — and some live and on-demand ESPN Unlimited programming will be available to watch within YouTube TV.
In addition, some unspecified Disney networks will be available to be included in genre-specific packages. According to multiple reports this year, YouTube TV is interested in creating the kind of lower-cost sport-specific ‘skinny bundles’ that have been made available on DIRECTV and Fubo in recent months.
But unlike YouTube TV’s previous conflicts with NBCUniversal and Fox Corporation, or Disney’s prior conflicts with DIRECTV and Charter, the recent impasse centered less on the programming itself than on price — specifically the rate YouTube TV will play for access to ESPN and ABC — and it was not immediately clear how that was resolved.
At more than two full weeks, the Disney-YouTube TV conflict was the longest carriage dispute for one of the “Big Four” networks in recent memory, surpassing Disney’s blackouts on DIRECTV last year and Charter two years ago. It was widely believed that the blackout impacted viewership for ESPN/ABC programming, though “Monday Night Football” this past week delivered one of its largest audiences all season.
Despite its heavy PR campaign at the start of the conflict — enlisting on-air talent from ESPN anchors to local meteorologists to tell its side of the story — Disney bore the brunt of public criticism throughout. Some of that criticism even came internally from ESPN host Pat McAfee.
For its part, YouTube TV has now entered or narrowly averted open conflict with Disney, Univision, NBCU and Fox Corporation in just three months, and that is not including smaller-scale conflicts like its blackout of the Monumental Sports Network RSN.
